Fifties Design...

The fifties was the beginning of the post-war period, the majority of the world had recovered from the harship and deprivation, and everyone just wanted to put the past behind them and move on. 'Blue skies design' was a phrase coined by American designer Raymond Loewy to describe an optimistic beginning. This is where 'modern design' came in, and there was a boom in the interior design world where people threw out the old and brought in the new. The houses were smaller than the build of the ones before the war, and so it came about that furniture had to be lighter and portable, it was in the fifties that the ironing board and sofa beds were invented.

An advertisement for Crane Radiators 1952 (taken from the book Design in the Fifties by George H. Marcus)... This is how a 'modern' fifties living room may look:

This is an advertisement for Kelvinator appliances (1955) showing a woman in a fitted kitchen with all the latest 'colour matched' appliances, which was the domain for wives in that era. A lot of the advertisements for kitchens had a common focus, women, it showed the attitude of them staying at home, cooking, cleaning and looking after the children while the husband would be at work. Very rarely in these advertisements would the women actually look directly into the camera showing their innocent and weak side, those who did look at the camera were portrayed showing naivety and silence, in the form of a closed mouth smile or plain expression to emphasise that women should 'be seen and not heard', they were merely objects to be looked at under the male's gaze.


The colour scheme of the advert is pastel and very feminine, which suits the domain the advert is based around. Unlike advertising today, there is quite a lot of text included, and it isn't readable either, when I first looked at the advert I read the text in bold, and moved straight to the eight colours at the bottom.

This is another example showing how women are used in the advertising industry of that time, there is no face shown just a hand showing their weakened postition in society. A veriety of fonts have been used in this advert, and a combination between serif and sans serif fonts, which altogether it looks a little bit chaotic. I do like the scripted font used at the top for 'Quality by Zenith' and then the description of what product is being advertised in a clearer serif font. Again, the colour scheme is quite soft, the colours aren't bright and vivid.


Things I need to consider when producing my fifties designs:
- Font - scripted? accompanied by serif type?
- Colour scheme - pastel in the style of fifties or with a modern twist?
- Imagery - the illustration type image that is so commonly used in these adverts?
- Women - do I need to 'follow suit' and show females in my advertising?